Playing the Two-level Game: Us President Bush's Decision to Repudiate the Kyoto Protocol

Putnam's two-level game metaphor is used as a framework for analysing the US repudiation of the Kyoto Protocol. It is argued that President Bush repudiated the Protocol, and used California's energy crisis and the Byrd-Hagel Senate Resolution to legitimise his hawkish approach, for three related reasons. First, Bush was personally dissatisfied with the Protocol. Second, the failure of the negotiations in The Hague at COP-6 Part I seemed to prove what many observers had long suspected: that further negotiations would not lead to a Protocol the US Senate could ratify. And third, Bush could not credibly engage in further negotiations on the Protocol while pursuing his preferred domestic energy policy of expanding oil and gas production. The implications of the interconnection between US domestic politics and the international climate change negotiations are remarked on by way of conclusion.